A welcome to the newest New Yorkers

Dear new New Yorkers from across the world and the country, including, yes, Iowa and Ohio, My comments on Martin Luther King Day made some people upset, so I want to set a few things straight.

One of the things that makes our city great is the continual infusion of new people from diverse backgrounds, who contribute in myriad ways to our social, economic and civic life. New York is a melting pot of cultures, ethnicities, languages, religions. We don’t vilify people based on where they come from, we seek to build bridges between communities and celebrate what unites us.

People who come from other places give the city its unique energy, making this such an exciting and dynamic place to live.

At the same time, you should know that the rapid changes happening across our city right now are causing a lot of pain among longtime residents and businesses. That pain takes many forms: the woman who gets an eviction notice from her landlord after living in her home for decades. The restaurant owner of a neighborhood institution who received so many noise complaints she’s forced to close down her business. The teenager hanging out on his stoop who has to explain to the police why he’s out so late.

These might sound like abstract scenarios to you, if you recently arrived here having read about “the new Brooklyn.” But I hear these stories every day. And as someone who grew up in a low-income household and has called New York home for my entire life, I feel compelled to speak out.

Gentrification can’t just be summed up in charts and numbers; it has a real human cost. It gradually makes long-time residents feel like strangers in the communities they’ve known for years. Try to imagine the psychological toll this takes. Have you ever seen a place you loved dearly lose its character suddenly?

There’s research to back up my concerns. A 2017 study from the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene found that people who were displaced as a